The university is ranked within the world's top 500 institutions in the Academic Ranking of World Universities. In January 2019, Times Higher Education rankings of the world’s top universities ranks Flinders in the 251 – 300th bracket.[3]

By the late 1950s, the University of Adelaide's North Terrace campus was approaching capacity. In 1960, Premier Thomas Playford announced that 150 hectares (370 acres) of state government-owned land in Burbank (now Bedford Park) would be allocated to the University of Adelaide for the establishment of a second campus.[4]

Planning began in 1961. The principal-designate of the new campus, economist and professor Peter Karmel, was adamant that the new campus should operate independently from the North Terrace campus. He hoped that the Bedford Park campus would be free to innovate and not be bound by tradition.[4]

Capital works began in 1962 with a grant of ₤3.8 million from the Australian Universities Commission. Architect Geoff Harrison, in conjunction with architectural firm Hassell, McConnell and Partners, designed a new university that, with future expansions, could eventually accommodate up to 6000 students.[4]

In 1965, the Australian Labor Party won the state election and Frank Walsh became premier. The ALP wished to break up the University of Adelaide's hegemony over tertiary education in the state, and announced that they intended the Bedford Park campus to be an independent institution.[4]

On 17 March 1966, a bill was passed by state parliament officially creating the Flinders University of South Australia.[5] Although the Labor Party had favoured the name "University of South Australia", academic staff wished that the university be named after a "distinguished but uncontroversial" person. They settled upon British navigator Matthew Flinders, who explored and surveyed the South Australian coastline in 1802. Its coat of arms, designed by a professor in the Fine Arts faculty, includes a reproduction of Flinders' ship Investigator and his journal A Voyage to Terra Australis, open to the page in which Flinders described the coast adjacent the campus site.[4]

Flinders University was opened by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, on 25 March 1966.[5]Peter Karmel was the first Vice-Chancellor and Sir Mark Mitchell the first Chancellor. The university began classes on 7 March 1966 with a student enrollment of 400.

A significant early initiative was the decision to build the Flinders Medical Centre on land adjacent to the campus and to base the university's Medical School within this new public hospital - the first such integration in Australia. Flinders first accepted undergraduate medical students in 1974, with FMC being opened the following year.[5]

View of Flinders University main campus, with central plaza and lakeside area visible.

In 1990, the biggest building project on campus since the mid-1970s saw work commence on three new buildings - Law and Commerce; Engineering; and Information Science and Technology. Approval for the establishment of a School of Engineering was given in 1991 and degrees in Electrical and Electronic Engineering[6] and Biomedical Engineering[7] were established shortly afterwards.

In 1991, as part of a restructuring of higher education in South Australia, Flinders merged with the adjacent Sturt Campus of the former South Australian College of Advanced Education.

In 2016, the University celebrated its 50th anniversary with a calendar of public events,[17] and a publication[18] summarising the highlights of the University's history, research, and alumni achievements over the last 50 years.[19]

On 1 July 2017, the University restructured from a two-tier academic system of four faculties and 14 schools, to a single-tier structure consisting of six colleges.[20]

View of the courtyard of the Humanities building of the Flinders University.

Flinders University offers more than 160 undergraduate and postgraduate courses, as well as higher degree research supervision across all disciplines. Many courses use new information and communication technologies to supplement face-to-face teaching and provide flexible options.

The university is ranked within the world's top 500 institutions in the Academic Ranking of World Universities.[35] The latest Times Higher Education rankings of the world’s top universities ranks Flinders University in the 301-350 bracket.[3]

Empire Times was published by the Students' Association of Flinders University (SAFU) from 1969 to 2006. The founder and first editor of the newspaper was Martin Fabinyi, and the newspaper was originally printed in the back of his house by fellow student Rod Boswell. Empire Times had a history of controversial humour and anti-establishment discussion. Notable former editors and contributors included Martin Armiger and Greig (HG Nelson) Pickhaver, Steph Key and Kate Ellis. Empire Times ceased publication in 2006 as a result of voluntary student unionism, but resumed in 2013.[36]